


Here and Gone and Here

by puptart



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: Consensual Possession, Gender-Neutral Runner Five, Ghosts, Like major spoilers for season 5 mission 20, Other, also non-consensual possession, season five spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-24
Updated: 2016-07-24
Packaged: 2018-07-26 10:33:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7570807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/puptart/pseuds/puptart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>*******MAJOR SEASON FIVE SPOILERS**********</p><p>This fic takes place almost immediately after Season 5 Mission 20, so if you haven't done that mission yet, DON'T READ THIS. If you have, PLEASE READ THIS and cry with me.</p><p>*******MAJOR SEASON FIVE SPOILERS**********</p><p>There's only so much consolation one can get from the ghost of their dead best friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here and Gone and Here

**Author's Note:**

> *****MAJOR SEASON FIVE SPOILERS******
> 
> Seriously, if you haven't done 5.20, you should do that.
> 
> We dealt with Sam Yao's death in Season 4, and it was awful. I can't imagine Sam taking Five's death any better, and I figure, hell, we're in hiatus. Why not take the opportunity to say what I'd love to see happen before canon runs it over? I already posted this first chapter on my tumblr, but then I went in and ripped some bits out and shoved other bits in, so this is a heavily edited version. Parts 2 and 3 are in the works. 
> 
> Runner Five goes grey, then they show up in Sam Yao's bedroom in Noah Base. They never expected to be on this side of the equation, and Sam never expected to see them again, period.

It's a manifestation of his grief, he thinks at first. People hear the voices of their loved ones after they die all the time. Sam can't even count on both hands the number of times he's thought he'd seen or heard Alice, or Chris, or any number of the other dead runners he's known and watched turn. Sometimes it was because in Abel he could see someone running around in one of Maggie's old baseball caps, or Jody huddled in one of Alice's old hoodies; shoes were always retired, of course, but clothes tended to be passed on to others. It's as much out of practicality as it is sentiment.

So far as his family goes though, he doesn't have that excuse. Maxine has assured him that it's normal. He's loathe to disagree.

It must be something like wishful thinking. Sam has been wishing and praying and begging for Runner Five to come back, please, just come back, almost non-stop, despite knowing that there's no bringing them home now. He knows that. He's been through this enough times to know that wishes don't amount to much in the face of the grey. It doesn't stop him from wanting Five back to the point that it's all he can think about.

It's been two days since Five went grey. Sam's in bed, his sleep restless, his heart breaking into smaller and smaller pieces with every dream where Five is alive and well, only to wake up and remember that they're gone. The most recent one has him pressing his hands to his eyes before he's even fully conscious again. He turns in bed to look at the small alarm clock on his desk to see that it's the middle of the night. To the right of the clock, barely illuminated by the soft, red glow of the numbers, stands an achingly familia figure. 

Sam has gone through the grief of losing runners more times than he cares to remember; seeing Runner Five, just as he's seen so many before them, doesn't surprise Sam in the least.

Five seems surprised to see him though.

"Woah," they say, blinking in surprise, and Sam flinches. In the dim light, he can just barely make out the jagged zombie bite on their forearm, bleeding freely, just as they had been before he watched them turn. Of course his subconscious wouldn't be kind enough to show him a Runner Five who was healthy and whole. For their part, Five inspects the wound placidly before their eyes zero back in on him, drawn like a magnet. Nonsensically they say, "I never thought I'd see this side of it."

Sam ignores it. Normal grieving behavior notwithstanding, he will  _not_ speak to the hallucination. He will, however, allow himself to curl forward in bed and cry over the hallucination. He's done this before, had to deal with so many deaths before, had to deal with seeing them all afterwards, but that doesn't make it any easier. 

Five, or the hallucination of them, murmurs comforting words as he sobs, nothing he can understand through the layer of grief that's made everything blurry-edged, but their voice, just like he remembers, is as much a comfort as it is a provocation to cry harder. 

It doesn't go away.

He doesn't speak to it, even when he's done crying and manages to pull his head together enough to look up at it. It stares at him, not speaking anymore, seeming at a loss for what to do. When he gets out of bed and leaves his room, the hallucination goes with him.

It's dark in the hallways, to simulate night time, he supposes, or maybe to conserve energy; they keep the walkways dim even in the daytime hours, but he would be bumping into the walls if not for the faint, blue running lights. He isn't sure where he's going exactly, just that he can't be in his room right now. Not there, where the laptop he watched Five die on sits on his desk. The hallucination of Five follows him closely, less sure of the way than he is. When he increases the speed of his steps, he doesn't know if it's the anxiety of what's happened recently spurring him on, of if it's the desire to be away from the hallucination. As if he could ever outrun Five, in any of their manifestations.

Sam ends up in the kitchen, and finds Jody already there at the table, knitting by the light of a solar lamp. Her head snaps up when Sam raps his knuckles on the doorway gently as he walks in, Five right on his heels. There's a soft intake of breath from over his shoulder, but he doesn't look, just meets Jody's gaze and says, "Hey."

He hasn't talked to anyone but Janine since the mission. She'd assured him he wouldn't have to, a kindness he hadn't really expected from Janine now, of all times. Not when so much is going on, and he's needed, but she'd kept her word. There have been no missions since, and everyone has granted him the space he desperately needed.

Jody's eyes widen at the sight of him.

"Oh, Sam," she says, voice a little rough, and Sam doubts she's gotten any more sleep than he has recently. It's been two days, but he hasn't been able to bounce back the way he has in the past. Owen and Five, all in one fell swoop. It's too much. 

Without another word, Jody casts aside her shaky knitting and crosses the room with fast, stern strides before seizing him around the middle and burying her face in the front of his shirt. Not a moment later he feels the material dampen, and he brings his arms up around her.

"Oh God, Sam," Jody sniffs. "I miss them." Sam swallows hard, but thankfully has already used up his tears for the night.

"I do, too," he says, holding her so tight he's sure it must hurt. He hopes desperately that he won't lose her as well, on top of everyone else. Sam finds he's running quite low on good friends, in comparison to where he stood in that regard just a few days before. Jody tiptoes up and buries her face in his neck, fisting her hands into the back of his sleep shirt.

When he glances up, he sees that Five has stepped past him, into the kitchen, and is watching the embrace with a miserable expression. It makes him feel horrible for ignoring him, but they aren't real. It isn't real.  _Jody_ is real, and she needs him, more than some figment of his imagination does.

He sits down at the table with Jody once they've both gotten themselves together, and they chat quietly for the next few hours while her hands work nimbly with the yarn and needles. If asked what they talked about, Sam wouldn't have the first idea, just that it was all nonsense; things that have no consequence at all. If not for Five sitting on the counter, watching and listening with the skin around their eyes darkened in illness and the blood dripping from their arm, he could almost pretend everything was okay.

Hours later, though he couldn't say how many, Maxine comes in with Sara on her hip, giving him a tight, supportive smile. He does his best to return it, but finds it more natural to reach for his daughter, rather than pretend he's okay. She's fussy, unhappy to be awake, but he's glad to see her. Tiny hands grasp at his nose, his ears, the overgrown bit of his fringe, Sara's face scrunching up as she makes soft, growly baby sounds.

Sam gives her his first genuine smile in days.

Paula comes in just a moment later, and she gives him a warm, sleepy hug, pretending to squash Sara between them, before starting in on finding breakfast. He and Maxine go sit back at the table where Jody is still steadily working. Sam bounces Sara while Jody shows Maxine her latest project, halfway finished after their long night awake together. Across the room, leaning on the wall near where Paula is absentmindedly searching through containers, Five catches his eye, their gaze melancholy.

The rest of the day slides by slowly. There's plenty of work to be done, all of urgent, more so due to his absence, but he can't seem to do more than fumble his way through the tasks while Five watches. They offer small snatches of advice here and there, or encourage him to keep trying, even when he gets frustrated with himself. Once they start telling him to take a break instead, he knows it's all a wash, and resigns himself to opening up the laptop. 

He switches the camera view as quickly as he can when the image of that training area pops up on the screen. Blessedly, Five has no comment to add.

Later he eats dinner with Janine at the desk, laptop still open, showing a view around the outside of the base. They're both silent as they eat, and Five hums behind them, sitting on Sam's bed. He remember this song as one they used to sing under their breath on missions all the time. 

Five used to sing, hum, and whistle all the time, but almost never whole songs. Half the time it was just a single line of a song, or chorus, or advertising jingle, whatever they had stuck in their head at the time. It had been infuriating, because they'd get it stuck in Sam's head just as surely as it was stuck in theirs, and they'd just laugh when he complained about it; he's certain that they did it on purpose half the time, just to get a rise out of him. Now he wants nothing more than to hear them do it again. 

Janine doesn't ask what has him so distracted as they eat, but he doubts she thinks it's because he wracking his brain to remember what song it is they've been humming on loop for the last half hour. 

By the time he's laying in bed that night, staring at the ceiling and utterly failing to do anything close to sleeping, he asks, "When are you going to leave?"

Five is dead silent for a long moment, before they haltingly ask, "You're talking to me?"

"Yes." He doesn't bother to point out that there isn't anyone else around to talk to. Technically, he's not sure they're around to talk to either.

"...You.... You want me to leave?" The raw hurt in their voice manages to be a knife in his chest, and he sits up in bed to look at them where they're leaning a hip on his desk, shoulders drawn up to their ears. The sight makes him ache all the more.

"No," he says, then jams a hand through his hair. "Yes. I want- I want  _Five_ , not a hallucination."

Five tilts their head, considering him. "Saying I'm real isn't going to go far convincing you that I am."

"No," he agrees, heart aching more the longer he lets himself look at them. He wants them to be real, so much. They fidget with the hem of their shirt, the blood on their arm dripping, though not a drop touches the floor.

"I don't want to leave you," they say, very quietly. A second knife joins the first.

"I didn't want you to leave me either," he says, and can't believe he's talking to a figment of his imagination. It feels wrong not to though. Fake or not, no part of him takes pleasure in denying Five. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry," they say with a wry smile. "I cheated death too many times, it was just time to pay my debt."

" _Don't,_ " Sam snaps, startling Five and himself with the ferocity in his voice. Five never should have died though. After all they'd been through, after everything they'd had  _done_ to them, the last person who deserved to have their happy ending stolen was Five, and if he's being honest, he doesn't think he deserved to lose them either. Knowing how close they'd been to living, to being here in his room for real, close enough to touch, is just salt in the wound.

"Sorry," Five says, voice carefully measured. "And, uh. Thank you, Sam."

"Thank you?" he asks, indignation sliding away to let confusion take its place. "For what?"

"I never wanted you to see me like that, but," they meet his eye, gaze pinning him in place with its intensity. "I was so glad to hear you when I put that headset on, I can't even properly describe it. Yours was the last voice I heard, and I always wanted it to be that way. I'm really grateful that you stayed with me in the end."

Sam feels guilt roiling in his stomach at the reminder; his last words to Five while they'd been alive had all been him begging them not to die, something they couldn't possibly help. Even when they were breathing their last breath, he hadn't been able to stop himself from being selfish. They deserved to have had someone consoling them, telling them that it was okay, that they'd done good. Instead, he'd hounded them, asking for more than they could possibly give. More, more, more.

"I miss you," he says, voice cracking. Five sighs, then to his surprise, carefully signs,  _miss you also_ with clumsy hands.

That starts him crying all over again, just when he thought he might be done. He can't remember the last time the real Runner Five had signed to him. They'd relied on it less and less as a means of communication as their throat had healed from that helo crash, but it had been something they had learned together. After that fateful night where Five had first been caught out after dark in New Canton territory, and they'd come back with a fierce look in their eye, snatching the first piece of paper they could find on his desk and a pen. He remembers them scribbling a note, asking if he'd help them learn to sign, so they could tell him something.

 _Friend_ , had been the first thing they'd signed to him, smiling broadly, the very day El Kwargo had scrounged up a BSL book. That might be the first time Sam had, had his breath stolen away by Five. He can't remember the last.

Sam jolts when he feels a shock of cold pressure on his shoulder, and stares down at Five's hand resting there. He hadn't noticed them cross the room. He can't truly feel their hand, not like if it was something solid, but he knows that's what the sensation he's feeling it.

"You're real," he breaths, disbelief coloring his words.

"Maybe. Relatively?" they offer weakly. "Let me stay, Sam."

He nods, and eventually the convince him to lay back down and try to sleep again. They hum quietly to themself, and he strains his ears to listen, wants to hear it, to be certain they're still there. Sam doesn't actually sleep more than a few minutes in short snatches of time, scared they'll leave, but every time he lifts his head to check, Five is still there, glancing up to meet his eye.

They don't leave.

 

*

Sam is careful not to look at Five when other people are around, but it’s hard to keep his mouth shut when all he wants to do while going over the mission plan with everyone else is to ask Five’s opinion on it. It's second nature by now, almost instinct, to seek their support or just their attention. He thinks he might have slipped up even if they weren't still idly prowling around during mission planning. 

That doesn’t make it any easier during a horrible, awkward moment while he and Janine are deciding who will be the one to lead a very difficult, very speedy run through one of the New Canton satellite settlements. Everyone is sitting around the tables they’ve shoved together in the kitchen, sharing ideas. Sam isn't really thinking about it, he forgets, and he says, “Five is our best bet at-”

It’s just a little slip, he catches himself before he finishes the sentence, practically choking on the end of it, but everyone goes deathly still in the pause that follows. No one even dares draw a breath for a long moment, and Five, who was looking over Tom’s shoulder at the map, looks up at him sympathetically, their mouth a firm line.

Peter ends up offering to do the run, Sam’s pretty sure, and Janine doesn’t even consider anyone else, just takes the offer and moves on to the next bullet on the agenda. No one addresses what he said, though Jody ends up sighing morosely for the remainder of the meeting. Sam, for his part, feels a little outside of himself until Janine dismisses them.

“Are you sure you want me to stay?” Five asks tentatively as they walk down the hall, once they're well away from everyone else. “I know it’s got to be hard, especially around the others.”

“Do you want to leave?” he mutters. Even with no one else around, he feels like someone will jump out of nowhere and ask who the hell he's talking to. Especially given the way Peter has been staring at him as of late.

“Not in the least.” Five cuts a look at him. “I mean, hell Sam, I’m still not convinced this isn’t heaven.”

“Heaven?” He snorts, and Five looks offended.

“Being here with you is all I wanted when I died,” they say, like it’s simple as that. “I prayed for it, so I won’t spit in the face of whatever deity granted my wish.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that. It reminds him of his own feelings, and he wonders how many other things Five feels about him that mirror what he feels about them.

Swallowing hard, Sam tentatively reaches out and brushes the tips of his finger to the back of their hand. It’s the one with the wound, rivulets of blood running down to drip off their knuckles. He can see his hand touching their skin, the blood, but again, it feels almost like nothing but a strange, almost-solid sort of cold. The tips of his fingers dip inside their hand, and they both shiver. Five blinks at the point of contact, their hand flexing, and smile ruefully.

“I’m not leaving until you ask me to go,” they say firmly.

 

*

 

Five is tired, a lot. Sam’s used to them lounging about, conserving energy to be spent all at once on a training field or for a mission; he’s just not used to them never spending that energy.

“Running doesn’t do anything,” they say hollowly from where they’re sprawled on the floor at his feet. Sam is monitoring the cameras again, waiting for Janine to tell him when the next mission out is. For now, he’s just keeping an eye on Maxine and Paula taking the baby out for a little fresh air. 

“What d’you mean?” he asks. 

Five takes a deep breath, though who knows if they actually need it or if it’s just habit by this point. They look up at him, those same eyes so familiar though oddly hazy, and say, “I can’t feel.”

Sam’s face scrunches up. “You can’t feel?” Five shakes their head, which seems painful to do on a concrete floor, but if what they’re saying is true, then…

“Everything is dull. Like my body’s been numbed. I can tell when I’m touching something, kind of, but I don’t…” They frown. “It’s awful.” He doesn’t know what to say to that. While he’s trying to think of something, they seem to realize they’ve complained, and push themself up to sitting and give him a lopsided smile. “Bearable though. I get to see you, and everyone else.”

“Don’t change the subject,” Sam admonishes, almost like old times. “That sounds really horrible.” Five visibly tries to find something to say, anything to placate him, but ultimately stays silent. “I’m sorry, Five. God, I am, just… Really, really sorry.”

“S’okay,” they mutter, embarrassed. “Don’t cry.”

“I’m not,” he lies, turning back to the monitors. Maxine is pointing at something, but considering the trio of smiles he’s picking up, it’s nothing serious. While he’s distracted, there’s a sudden icy chill wrapped around his ankle that steals his breath.

“I can feel that, a bit,” Five says, and then let’s go of him. The chill stays on his skin, but not for as long as it ought to. “When you touched my hand earlier. I could tell you were doing it.”

“What- What does it feel like?” Sam asks. Five hums thoughtfully. 

“I dunno. Jelly?” They shrug, and Sam can’t help but laugh. “That’s as close as I can describe it!”

“That’s so gross, Five,” Sam tells them, and this time they give him a real smile. “Eugh, don’t touch me.”

“Try and stop me,” they say with a grin, hands held out like claws.

“Aw, Five, c’mon,” Sam whines, kicking his chair back to stay out of their range.

This is familiar. Five shining bright and teasing and Sam’s chest feeling so full of affection and admiration he could split in two. They give him a wolfish grin that they picked up from Sara and never put down, and reach out with grabby fingers. Sam kicks off the floor again, his chair gliding across the smooth surface before he bumps into the far wall.

“Trapped, Yao!” Five crows, on their feet now, and stalking forward slowly. Sam’s barely stifling his laughter now, and he’s enjoying this, having fun, but he actually  _ doesn’t  _ want them to touch him with their ridiculously chilly hands. Memories of this exact situation happening before filter through his mind; Five didn’t like wearing gloves when they ran, even in the snow, and they always tried to press their frozen fingers against his neck or under his shirt when they came back home.

“Fiiiive,” he cringes back, still smiling though, and Five pounces.

Through the door, Janine’s voice suddenly filters through. “Mr. Yao? What are you doing? Are you speaking to someone?”

Both of them freeze, Five poised over him, looking paler and less solid around the edges than usual. Almost too quickly, they retreat to the far side of the room, and Sam crawls his chair forward, away from the wall.

“Oh, uh,” he draws the word out uncertainly, not sure what excuse he can give here. ‘Sorry Janine, just talking to the possible grief induced hallucination of my best friend’? Yeah, that would go well. “I… Fell.”

Five slaps a hand over their face. Silence stretches for several long moments.

“I see,” says Janine, clearly not buying it. “Are you ready for our reconnaissance?” 

He lets her in, and they sit together at his desk, hunched over the laptop, thighs pressed together. Five quietly hums across the room, something sad and slow. It’s hard to concentrate, but he manages, and together he and Janine work for an hour scouring the landscape. They track zom activity, adding the data to what’s already in Janine’s notebook, and make special note of any human movement as well. 

The mission won’t be for another few days; Janine pushed it back after getting the news about Owen. It had been a dual mission, meant to extract Five and cripple Sigrid’s helicopter, along with whatever other automobiles they possibly could. Then Nadia had managed to get a message to him about Five being in Veronica’s lab… 

He sucks in a hard breath through the nose. There have been three different delays on this mission, three different adjustments to mission prerogatives made. They’ve been working on almost no inside knowledge since Sigrid left for London, and less now that Steve’s been laid out and possibly blinded. It makes him wonder why they bother with a plan. They’ll just have to change it anyways. Might as well just arm everyone to teeth and bullrush Abel, take out who they can.

That’s a stupid idea though, it’ll just get everyone killed. Sigrid’s too strong to take anything under her control by force. For now, it’s all subtlety and knife and cloak tactics; Janine’s specialty, Sam is coming to realize. As awful of a situation as this all is, it’s giving Sam more insight into what makes Janine tick than he’s ever gotten before. He’s always known she was brilliant, but before all of this it had felt like she over thought things, made them too complicated when a simple solution would do. 

Now they need that over thinking if they want to have any hope of staying ahead of Sigrid’s bullets.

Sam glances at Five. They’ve gone quiet, looking contemplative, but mostly ignore what Sam and Janine are doing. He supposes there’s no point in them poking their nose into it. They can run, sure, but they’ve tried and failed to affect anything on the physical plane. All they have at their disposal is their presence. 

For two hours he sits with Janine, quiet but for a few brief exchanges when they need to swap cameras. It should feel familiar, comforting, having her at his side. It’s where he’s most used to her being, where he wants her, in all honesty, but when he looks at her it’s not the same. Usually she’s so sharp and focused, closed off entirely until she looks him in the eye. Now though, her edges are blunted. Her jaw isn’t clenched in concentration, her eyelids droop. She taps her pen on the desk, leaving little drops of ink on the wood, her gaze almost unfocused. 

Sam doesn’t have to ask what’s wrong. He knows the feeling.

“I’m surprised, Mr. Yao,” Janine says, when they’ve finished up for the day. She’s standing at the door, more in than out. Sam turns away from the laptop screen to look at her, and he sees her face, stern, but the expression barely holding together. Her grip on her notebook is almost crushing.

“By what?” He asks, and the expression starts to crack.

“By how well you’re handling Runner Five’s death,” she says.

It feels like an accusation. Like she thinks he should be more miserable, like it’s not affecting him at all, and white hot rage rips through him, words describing just  _ how well  _ he’s taking their death rising up in his throat to burn like bile.

A cold touch on the back of his neck makes him gasp in a breath, and stays his tongue. It’s the right choice, because not a moment later Janine adds, “I wish I was handling it better, myself. I didn’t expect to be so…” she trails off, her expression heartbreakingly lost.

“I just…” He sighs, swallowing hard. “I’ve talked a lot of runners through their deaths, I suppose. A lot of good people who were my friends.” The cold spot moves down to between his shoulders, the pressure increasing. “I’m not used to, exactly, but I’m… I’m good at compartmentalizing, I suppose.” A lie, an absolutely monumental lie, and he doesn’t know how Janine doesn’t catch him on it. 

Janine hums, not meeting his eye. Softly, she says, “I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Sam wants to say, ‘me neither’, but it’s different. She can’t see Five, bloodied arm and all, or hear their voice, cracking jokes and singing under their breath. They aren’t constantly present to her. Her thoughts are all her own.

“I wish I’d done better for them,” she says bitterly. “They trusted me to keep them safe, Mr. Yao, and I wasn’t even there to hear their dying words.”

“You were with the transport to bring them home, Janine,” he tells her, somehow not too tired to console her. “I recall having to beg you to stand down, rather than send you in to retrieve….” It’s practically an act of God that keeps him from glancing over his shoulder as he trails off.

“The body,” Janine says. No one has said the word ‘zombie’ in his presence in almost a week. He’s more than grateful for that small mercy, and he can imagine Five is glad of it too. They seem more than content to ignore their own death when they aren’t talking about it in a painfully straightforward manner.

“Right,” he agrees. “We all… We all did our best for Five. They knew that, I think.”

“Of course I did,” Five says, voice rough.

“I certainly hope you’re right, Mr. Yao,” Janine says, shaking her head. “I can’t bear the thought that they died, having spent so much time in hostile territory, because I was too stupid to think of a way to get them out of a situation I shoved them into.”

Behind him, Sam is dismayed to hear a strangled sob, and the cold pressure on his back disappears. Every muscle in his body screams to turn around and look to Five, to comfort them, but he can’t, not while Janine is looking at him, her eyes welling up with tears. She’d cried the whole way back to Noah Base, Tom consoling her as he drove, Paula quiet in the backseat. Sam’s not even sure how he’d managed to give them directions; hell, he might not have. He can’t remember much after the point where he couldn’t deny that Five had turned. Mostly he just remembers wishing he was dead too. 

“Janine,” he says, heart breaking in half. She sucks in a sharp breath, and visibly pulls herself together.

“We’ll make sure it wasn’t in vain, Mr. Yao,” she swears. “I’ll put the bullet in Sigrid’s head myself. Unless…” She looks at him questioningly, and he blinks.

“No,” he says, though not with the conviction he thinks he ought to have. Sam’s never… Well. He’s never killed anyone who didn’t ask him to do it. Sigrid’s death would be a pleasure, truly, but he doesn’t know if he could do it, if he had his finger on the trigger. The thought that he might hesitate, that that hesitation could allow her to slip away, it’s not fathomable. Janine, he knows, would not have that problem. Not in this situation.

“Very well,” Janine says, a vicious edge to her words that suggests she’d rather do it anyways and was just offering out of… He doesn’t know what. She gives him a stiff nod before leaving, closing the door with a sharp  _ click _ . As soon as her footsteps fade out, he spins in his chair, and Five is gone.

*

They reappear a few hours later, but won’t tell him where they’ve been.

“It wasn’t Abel, was it?” he asks, concerned, and they snarl, pausing in their pacing across his room to look at him.

“No.” They frown deeply. “Before I turned, Ian… Ian asked for my… I don’t want to know. I just don’t. I won’t go back there.”

Feeling ill, Sam doesn’t blame them in the least, and tries to distract them by showing them the rec room he’d set up, like he’d promised he would. He has to whisper the whole time, just in case someone walks in unannounced, but Five doesn’t seem to mind needing to be close to hear him. They don’t speak much as he shows them around, pulling out costumes and fake weapons, their thoughts clearly elsewhere, but they smile at him weakly whenever he pauses to look at them.

“Hello there, Sam.” 

Sam turns, stopping mid sentence to turn and see Peter lingering in the doorway. He’s got bags under his eyes and a heaviness to his shoulders that Sam finds he’s been attributing to everyone else at the base who’s mourning. Not everyone is mourning Five, exactly. Jody’s probably the only runner on base who knew Five as a friend, but the others were all pretty tight knit with Owen. It’s been a tough week for all.

For some reason though, the idea that Peter is affected by Five’s death bothers him. Why should someone who barely knew Five act like they have any idea what a loss them dying actually is? 

“Peter.” Sam resists the urge to cut a glance at Five. “Did you need something?” It’s rare for him to feel this frosty towards another person, but Sam doesn’t want Peter around. Something about him puts Sam on edge, something about how Peter seems to know more about everyone than a man who is ostensibly a stranger ought to.

His question goes unanswered. Peter’s attention almost immediately slides from Sam to something behind Sam. The hair on the back of his neck stands on end when he sees Five move in his peripheral, and Peter’s gaze moves with them.

“What are you looking at, Peter?” Sam asks, feeling very far away from himself. 

Peter snaps his eyes back to Sam, a panicked expression crossing his face. “Nothing.”

“Nothing,” Sam echoes, but doesn’t believe it. 

Peter turns on his heel and leaves, and he and Five turn to one another at the same time, eyes gleaming.

*

 

“Peter.”

Sam stretches his arms over his head, holding it for a few seconds, then lets them fall, turning the page of his book. Erik had found it the other day, and though it’s interesting, Sam’s only feigning reading. Across the room, where Peter is thumbing through his own novel, Five continues to pester him.

“Peter,” they say again. Sam’s lost count of how many times they’ve said his name. He hasn’t responded a single time, though Sam swears his eye had lingered on Five when they came in with Sam before hurriedly returning to his book. “Peeeeterrrrr.”

Sam glances up, and sees Five stick their hand over the pages of Peter’s book. His jaw is clenched, but he continues ignoring them. Unless, of course, he can’t actually see or hear Five, and they’re both just grasping at straws. Sam still isn’t certain he’s not imagining Five as a coping mechanism, and it would certainly be a relief if someone else could see them too.

“Peter, you can see me,” Five says, almost chidingly. “I know you can hear me.”

Peter blinks, and turns a page. It goes right through Five’s hand, and they give a mild shudder of discomfort. Sam bites the inside of his cheek and puts his eyes back on the novel in his lap. Maybe they are just being overly hopeful. He decides to pretend to read for just a few minutes, and then he’ll leave.

“Sam can, you know?” Five says, and he almost looks up again. It’s been a day since they both suspected that Peter could see Five. Since then, they’ve mostly been badgering him by saying his name or standing in front of him (though he only had to walk through them twice before they gave that up). This is the first attempt at talking to him that Sam has heard.

“I think I need some fresh air,” Peter said suddenly, shoving his book aside to stand up. Five jerks back in a hurry. Mostly numb or not, they’ve made it clear that going through things is deeply uncomfortable.

“Before you go,” Five says in a rush. “I could always tell Sam your other name.”

Peter halts mid-step, and Sam swears the room drops in temperature. More than it already does with Five around, at least. Sam is looking on unabashedly now, practically vibrating in his seat, waiting to see what Peter will do.

“That…” Peter says, haltingly. He glances first at Sam, then back at Five, and he looks like a panicked animal, cornered utterly. “Stop.”

Five snorts. “Sorry hon,  _ you  _ don’t get to ask me to leave you alone.” After a moment they add, “You hypocrite.” Peter makes a strangled sound.

“You  _ can  _ hear Five,” Sam says, suddenly giddy. “I’m not crazy!” Five and Peter give him unimpressed looks.

“I suppose I can say the same,” Peter grumbles after a moment. “So… Five is…” He looks them up and down, eyes stick on their bloodied arm.

“Dead. Fully.” Five shrugs. Peter nods.

“Right, of course.” He sighs. “I guess I’d just hoped… Well.”

Sam feels very distinctly that he is not part of this conversation, and is ready to insert himself back into it. 

“How long have you been able to see Five?” he asks. Peter thinks for a moment.

“I first saw Five in the kitchen, a day or two after you got gnawed on,” Peter says, gesturing to Five’s arm. They nod.

“That’s the first time you would’ve been able to see me.” they say. 

“So you’ve been able to see Five this whole time, and said nothing?” Sam says. Peter rolls his eyes.

“They were always coming and going with  _ you _ , it’s not like I could just chat them up. ‘Oh yes, how are you Runner Five? Looking well, except how you have that chunk of flesh missing, and how you aren’t entirely solid’, that would go  _ so well _ .”

Irritation twigs in Sam’s throat. “Wow, so even though you thought you were imagining them, Five wasn’t following you, but me, and that seemed normal to you?”

Peter huffs. “Where the hell else would I expect Five to be,” he says, a touch bitter. Five shoots Peter a look that Sam can’t parse. Peter softens a touch, sighing, and straightens up. 

“None of that matters,” Five says. “You can both see me. You can both hear me. That’s…” they trail off, suddenly looking self-conscious. “That’s good, I think.”

“Course it is,” Sam says, though Peter looks dubious. 

All he’s wanted since he watched Steve Sissay drag Five’s unconscious body out of that shack, after he and Ian ambushed them on that awful mission, is to have Five back here, with him, where they belong. This might not be the ideal situation but…

He shoots them a smile, and the one the return, though weak, makes his chest feel full and his blood hot. It’s still Five. Uncertain as he was to begin with, he has no doubt now. This is his Runner Five, and he’ll do whatever it takes to keep them.

“Welcome to the club, Peter,” Sam says, and Peter smirks.

“I expect my welcome fruit basket to be on my bed before dinner,” he says.

  
  
  


 


End file.
